Joseph Valachi

Joseph "Joe Cargo" Valachi (22 September 1904-3 April 1971) was a Genovese crime family mobster.

Biography
Joseph Valachi was born in East Harlem, New York City on 22 September 1904 to a family of poor Italian immigrants, and he became involved with a "smash-and-grab" business as a youth. During the early 1930s, he became a soldier in the Lucchese crime family under Gaetano Reina, serving as a bodyguard under Salvatore Maranzano before becoming a soldier in the Genovese crime family under Lucky Luciano. In 1963, Valachi became famous for testifying before a US Senate sub-committee on organized crime, revealing the existence of the American Mafia by calling it the "Cosa Nostra". In doing so, he broke the Mafia code of silence (omerta), and he lived under federal protection until his 1971 death at the Federal Correctional Institute in La Tuna, Texas.